The Impossible Dream

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Addicted to Speed

I got my first ticket as a kid of eleven. I had a bicycle fitted out with a lawnmower engine, and about the first time I rode it more than a block from home, a cop made a U-turn on a busy street, hit his lights, and started bearing down on me.

“Run!” my friends yelled. I probably would have just sat there and waited for the LEO to arrive, but when I heard that word I gunned it and took off, cutting through alleys and back yards and working my knowledge of the neighborhood to compensate for my horsepower disadvantage as the cruiser shot up and down side streets trying to cut me off.

I’ve never done it since, but I’ve got to say there’s a certain thrill in trying to elude a police officer in hot pursuit.

I almost made it, too, when I ducked into a friend’s open garage and pulled the door down behind he, but Officer Obie saw me and, to say the least, he came out of that cruiser so angry you’d have thought I’d robbed a bank and was shooting over my shoulder as he tried to bring me to justice. In the end I was written up for riding an unregistered motor vehicle and evading a law enforcement officer.

I’ve observed that LEOs have virtually no sense of humor when we stop to have a discussion of my driving habits. I remember I had to go to court with my dad, though I don’t remember what the sentence was. What could they do? I was eleven! Take away my license?

No, actually, that would have to wait until my sixteenth birthday when I got a license in the morning and promptly lost it that very afternoon when I got busted for going fifty in my parents Chrysler in front of the cute girl’s house a few blocks over. That would be fifty in a twenty-five. Pop! My second ticket, back in court with my dad, and I had to wait another six months before I could drive again. You’d think I would have learned.

But not, because like just about every motorcyclist I hang with, I’m addicted to speed. I love going fast. If motorcycles didn’t go fast and corner like the best roller-coaster I’ve ever ridden, I’d give them up and take up a hobby like model railroading. But they do go fast and there’s nothing I love more than sitting on top of one, tucking in low behind the fairing while I atomize about thirty dollars worth of rear tire behind me in a mad burst of acceleration, and—this especially—leaning into a turn fast enough to put the bike over at an angle that seems to defy physics and certainly common sense.

How fast? Well, a capable modern sport bike on a straight, open county road with no traffic just starts to feel planted and exciting at about a buck twenty. My bike, considered rather sedate by superbike standards, has a top speed of 155. I've never ridden it that fast. It will go from zero to sixty in a little over three seconds, again, rather slow by superbike standards but faster than virtually any car on the road, no matter how much you pay for it.

Corner speeds vary depending on the corner, of course. In tight twisties I can work the tires out to near the edge of their tread at speeds as low as maybe forty. Big sweepers get fun somewhere between 80 and 100. These numbers seem to indicate shocking irresponsibility to non-riders, but sitting around the campfire with my riding buddies, I might say something like I crossed the Klamath Marsh road at about a hundred and elicit little more than vague grunts of acknowledgement.

All of the above might suggest that I’m a cocky and irresponsible rider, but I try not to be. Most of the miles I ride are at a moderate touring pace, and I try to always keep something in reserve in case I run into the bit of stray gravel in a turn. In traffic I’m so defensive people begin to think I have a complex, and in wet conditions I ride so slow I’m in danger of being rear-ended by a street sweeper. And I know when I’m over my head, which I always am when I get with a bunch of the really fast guys. I’m happy to let them ride on ahead.

In fact, I’m basically a chicken, which is a big part of the reason I hope to be celebrating my 60th birthday in a few months. Still, in the end, I love motorcycles mostly because I’ve never outgrown my love of speed. If I had to ride a cruiser, I’d quit riding.

And all the guys I ride with—those conscientious, upstanding citizens; taxpayers and church-goers; doctors and lawyers, LEOs themselves; teachers and preachers and accountants; sensible, responsible individuals every one of them—they’re addicted to speed, too. We love to complain about inexperienced kids who ride way over their limit and give us a bad name with John Q. Public. In the end, if we encounter one on the road, though, we see if we can take him. We can’t help ourselves.

May we all live so long as to one day be able to talk about how we finally outgrew it. In the meantime, the most fun I can have in a single day usually involves going fast on two wheels.

User-Whee!

The state legislature has finally lanced a pustule on the ass of the Oregon body politic. By a vote of 18 to 11, the state senate voted to cap interest rates on consumer loans at 36 percent. The bill goes into effect July 1st.

I sure wish I could make 36 percent on anything, but for a decade now, Oregon’s payday loan sharks have been charging—but wait, you really have to take a guess on this.

How much do payday loan businesses need to charge to be able to stay in business: 100 percent? 200 percent? 300 percent?

Mais, non! Payday loan sharks need to charge 500 percent(!) interest just to stay in business. At 500 percent, they seem to be just getting by, which is why we now have more payday loan shops in Oregon than McDonalds.

A typical loan is about $300 and is made to a poor person who also happens to be stupid. They would use the money for discretionary items such as food and rent or to fix their car so they could get to work at their minimum wage job.

Some of them were Oregon lottery addicts, so in a way the PD loan industry was subsidizing state government, and I guess my pension, for that matter. Thanks!

Thing is, the loan would be due in a few weeks, and since Citizen Stupid doesn't have any more money now than he did then, he would pay a big fee to roll it over for another few weeks.

Where’d he get the money for the big fee? Why, right next door at another PD loan shop! You can see how poor money management skills, crap jobs, and a low IQ could combine to produce what people in the PD loan industry refer to as “clients.”

This has been an issue in Oregon for several years now as the newspapers have picked up on how the scam works and how many families and individuals it has forced into bankruptcy. It all started in the late 90s when the legislature lifted the cap on legal interest rates to adjust to the quickly rising loan rates. Instead of adjusting the usury definition upward, though, they just eliminated it.

Within minutes, signs went out on shop fronts, and loan sharks who used to work from street corners got to move indoors.

This detestable practice was allowed to continue for a decade because the sharks quickly formed a professional association and started lobbying and because Oregon Republicans have become so ideology-driven they don’t know a turd from a truffle anymore. “Let the market work,” one of them said in arguing against the new bill. There would also be a market for contract murder if we legalized it, but fortunately, that one hasn’t come up this session. No question it would have Republican support.

“Industry” spokesperson Steven Hanson said “These politicians don’t care about the small Oregon business owners who are going to be on the street. They ought to care about the consumers.”

Poor babies!

Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Toast the troops!

My friend Ed Robinson passes along a link to this website.

http://www.sixpacksforsoldiers.com/

I’m never quite sure what “support the troops” means, but this seems as good a way as any.

One of the small but telling ironies of this nasty little war is that our troops on the ground are not allowed to consume alcohol. No stopping by the enlisted men’s club for a cold one after a tough day of routing out terrorists. There is no Miller time in Iraq, this out of sensitivity to the Muslim prohibition against alcohol.

So as we’re over there fighting for their freedom and ours here at home—so it is hoped we will believe—our own troops are forced to conform to the tenets of a faith not their own. I think that’s wrong. I think commanders should have the balls to say to the locals, “Hey, we’re infidels! We’re drinking us some beer! Get used to it!”

Wanna bet those suits in the embassy find a way to smuggle in some liquid refreshment?